The Asterian Race
The people of Asteria are a mysterious race, they are not well known throughout this region of space and very little is known about them, not even what they look like. But do not be fooled, much may not be known about them but the one of the few things that are known about them is that they are not a friendly race, they fire on all alien vessels to come near their sole empire, the Imperial Asterian Coalition, and it's two systems, Stelaria and Yangiri Prime. A Hard to Read Expression The Asterians are not new to space, their people have roamed their corner of the sector for many generations and they have long had the capability to leave their system and explor the cosmos if they so desired... Up until recently, they did not desire exploration or even colonization beyond their system. Something has driven them to begin to do so, none the less. They are a secretive race who has not had much interaction with any of the other races of the sector but the rare glimpse into the borders of their empire are almost always breath taking and amazing and there are some less advanced races who have even proclaimed they must surely be gods. But while the Asterians are not well known, there is one question that has plagued those who have met them: why are they always in suits? The Asterians are not well known, their people spoken of as gods in some places and not at all in most others, yet they've only ever been seen in suits, whether they be armor or simply environmental suits is not even known, they have not once ever been seen in the flesh. Some have speculated they ARE those suits, that they have no skin or that they need the suits to leave their world, while others have theorized they're just robots, drones sent out to do the dirty work of their overlords. There is even a tale spread around at bars across the sector about a group of pirates who went in to capture a small Asterian vessel in hopes of prying open the suits and selling footage of what lay inside for a nice bit of loot. As one would expect, the story ends with "they were never seen again" but most who tell it seem to neglect to mention the Pirates in question weren't a very bright bunch and miscalculated their distance from a star they had to pass and ended up burning up, but it's a nice tale none the less... if you're completely smashed. A Cold Shoulder and a Warning Shot To Boot One fourty eight earth years ago, human scouts, the race still new to this galaxy, attempted to enter Asterian space in hopes of establishing contact with the mysterious race and perhaps even learn more about them... Their attempts to communicate were ignored and their ships were fired upon almost the moment they entered Imperial Coalition space. If one were to ask around, they would find this is pretty common for all other races to attempt contact or who neighbor them, in fact none have really made much contact with them, those few that have only ever got automated ship responses, the equivilant of getting the "answering machine" if a human were to contact someone on Earth during the Oil Age (modern period, IRL), or saw the suited figures from afar on some random world or another. There is one case, however, in which a captain managed to get a response from an Asterian vessel but the signal was poor and the language the Asterian captain spoke wasn't able to be translated at the time (though it was through that one interaction that a basic translation was able to be deduced and added to universal translators across the sector). Needless to say, the Asterians are not very friendly towards other races, or at least not very interested in making friends. In fact, the rare intercepted communication suggests they are even a xenophbic race, a race so uneasy and fearful towards alien or unknown races that they would much rather destroy your homeworld rather than even be in the same room as a member of your own race. Interesting enough, this has little impact on their economy... The Holy Goddess Most confusing of all about the Asterians, is that despite all their efforts to avoid other races, they are almost constantly broadcasting to the universe in countless different ranged communication formats, even the outdated radio signals. It is said that one of the first things every race in this galaxy hears when they discover new communication methods such as the radio is the word of Asteria, the holy goddess... No one quite understands why they do it (and indeed it wasn't until recent that most could even understand what they were saying), but the Asterians send out all kinds of information about their goddess, praising her, spreading the word of her glory and awe inspiring beauty, detailing her unimaginable power, it's really no wonder that most races believe it to be the word of the gods and slowly begin to convert to what has been deemed Akmahlanism... No one can say for certain if that is the name of the religion, the broadcasts aren't clear, the Asterians wouldn't respond if we asked...